Cruise ships are designed to be incredibly safe and reliable, so thankfully they don't sink very often. In fact, the last major cruise ship sinking was in 2012 when the Costa Concordia capsized off the coast of Italy.

The last major, high-profile sinking of a large cruise ship occurred on January 13, 2012, when the Costa Concordia struck a rock off the coast of Isola del Giglio in Italy. While "sinking" in the traditional sense often implies a ship disappearing entirely beneath the waves, the Costa Concordia capsized and came to rest on its side in shallow water after a massive 53-meter gash was torn into its hull. The disaster resulted in the deaths of 32 people and led to one of the most complex and expensive maritime salvage operations in history. In more recent years, there have been incidents involving smaller vessels, such as the sinking of the Orient Queen following the 2020 Beirut port explosion, or more localized incidents involving river cruise boats. However, for a major ocean-going luxury liner, the Costa Concordia remains the defining catastrophe of the modern era. Since then, the cruise industry has implemented even stricter safety protocols, including mandatory lifeboat drills before departure and advanced bridge management systems, to ensure a similar disaster never happens again.